As is known in the art, computer systems generally include a platform generally comprised of a certain hardware base, including a central processing unit and computer memory, an operating system, and application or utility software that runs on top of the operating system.
Some software is only applicable to certain hardware platforms for various reasons. It may not be supported at all, it may not be qualified yet, or the hardware may be missing some required feature. This applicability for a given platform may change over time, as, for example, qualification testing is completed on that platform. There is a benefit to a company to re-use software across platforms when possible, to reduce manufacturing, testing, support and development costs. It is useful to be able to introduce new hardware platforms without revising all the applicable software for that new platform. It is not possible at the time of creation of software to know which future platforms will exist or which ones will support that software. The checks built-in to the software are fixed at the time it is released, so they cannot take into account names or other specific details about future platforms. It would be advancement in the art to provide a way to allow a way for installing software that isn't known when a certain platform is released, or vice-versa.